Well, I made it; I’m sitting here writing this. There was a time just six months ago when I wasn’t sure whether I would have a roof over my head at this moment.
I’m Elena, and I’m writing this right here, right now, because I want to make sure that anyone who finds themselves where I was has the good sense to get meaningful help before they let things get out of control as I did.
See, for the longest time, I didn’t think there was anything wrong. Perfectionism was what made me good at my job, and while I knew I procrastinated sometimes, I would never have dreamed that it could take such a heavy toll on me and my family.
I was On Point
As an editor, making sure everything was perfect was the name of the game. I might cut it real close to the deadline, but I always got it done, and my work was always top notch. My publisher would except nothing less, and neither would I.
Meanwhile, I had two kids in elementary school and a husband who was a teacher at the local high school. Since I could and did work from home, I was the one who took care of the kids. So, how did everything go so wrong?
As you might guess, it started with the pandemic. Actually, it really started with my proclivity to procrastinate and the fact that I let my perfectionism at my job affect my personal life, but I didn’t realize it at the time.
Thrown Into Chaos
If you had to suddenly take care of your kids during the pandemic, you know how challenging it was. Almost overnight, I went from being the only one home during the day to the parent who had to make sure the kids were doing what they were supposed to be doing. Though my husband was teaching from home, he couldn’t be interrupted every few minutes. So, we tucked him away in my office, and I was the one in the kitchen with the kids. As you can imagine, this played hell with my scheduling.
Though I wasn’t super aware of it at the time, I got my work done in great bursts. I might be goofing off for an hour or two here and there, but then I would buckle down and edit a script for six hours straight.
Well, that paradigm was turned on its head. All of a sudden, I needed to be able to work for 10, 15, maybe 30 minutes at a time, deal with some issue or other, and then do it again. Well, it didn’t take long to realize that my new way of working was incompatible with my job.
Shut Down
The publishing industry is not forgiving. While my boss was understanding at first, my continued lower production was not going to cut it. I barely made it to summer, at which point my husband took over managing the kids. But when the same thing started happening in the fall, they fired me. I was the primary breadwinner in our household, so this was something that could see us forced from what was a nice home in a good school district. Unemployment wasn’t going to be enough to sustain us, and while the bank would let us get by paying less than the amount due for a while, the bill was going to come due at some point.
You might think that losing my job would mean that I could spend more time with the kids and taking care of the house, but even though I had more time, I was getting less done. Thrown out of my routine, I found myself unable to get things done because I couldn’t do them to my usual standards. I started to get much more nitpicky with the kids’ chores and schoolwork, which caused them to complain to my husband. He didn’t have the time to play referee, and this piled onto the already high stress level in the house.
While all this was going on, I was searching for other jobs, but my criteria were pretty stringent. Whatever job I got had to bring in as much money as my last one, or at least pretty close to it. I didn’t want to make less money working than I would from my unemployment benefits. Though I found some opportunities, none of them were good enough for me. My husband tried to tell me that a few would be good enough, but I wouldn’t listen. Eventually, it got to the point where he told me that something had to change, or he would have to start looking into divorce.
Wake-Up Call
That was enough to shake me out of the pawl that had settled over me. Here I was, a successful woman, and I was failing. I failed at work, and I was in the process of failing my family. This forced me to look for ways of changing my behavior. The first thing I tried was a virtual therapist. She helped me delve a little deeper into why I was the way I was, but it was clear that a solution was a long way off.
Then, late one sleepless night, I stumbled upon a site called Virtue Map. Normally, I would have scrolled right on by, but I was intrigued by the questions it was asking. With just a few well-worded questions, it was getting to the bottom of my perfectionism and procrastination. That made more sense when I realized that those questions were created by psychologists and wellness professionals.
After I finished the survey, the site presented me with a three-month customized plan that it claimed could rid me of my procrastination.
Well, I had my doubts that a website could do more than a therapist, but since the price was reasonable, I decided I would be foolish not to try it.
Rewiring My Process
That’s the best way I can describe what the Virtue Map plan did for me. It certainly didn’t happen overnight; the first few weeks were spent gaining a deeper understanding of why I was the way I was. Over the next few weeks, though, my plan gradually changed my way of thinking about my day-to-day routine until it felt like I was in command again. I wasn’t constantly trying to keep up with life; I wasn’t putting myself in situations where I had to rush to get things done; and I wasn’t fooling myself into thinking that unless I or someone else did something to my exact standards, then it wasn’t worth doing.
My kids and my husband noticed my change in mood right away. They tell me I’m far less stressed than I used to be, and I’m much more pleasant to be around than I was there for a bit.
I was able to get another editing job; this time without creating a situation where I could only be productive if I worked for hours at a time. This in turn allowed me to catch us back up on our mortgage, just barely dodging a huge bullet that would have been horrible for my kids.
But that was way too close for comfort. I’m sharing this with you so that hopefully, you can avoid that kind of pressure cooker situation and change your routine before things get out of hand. It all starts with taking a quick survey; just click the link below to get started. Three months from now, when time is no longer your enemy, you’ll be very glad you did.